Monday, April 19, 2010

Spring is in the air over here at Dick Move HQ (aka Planet LaPorte; aka the Super International Hall of Justice). Over the past 2 weeks I've managed to get some new grass seed planted, donate a bunch of shit I don't need to the Salvation Army, and clean my garage*. Then I was catching up on my buddy Hoagy's blog, When Cannons Fade and realized how behind I really am. He recently ran an article on the hoarding tendencies inherent in himself and gamers as well as the joys of having a 2 year old son mucking up the place. It's a great read and quite inspirational. Even with working and having a kid running around, he still finds the time to clean up after himself and get some painting in.

His article got me to thinking. I have some serious spring cleaning to do in my basement. I've got stacks of unassembled minis, too many simultaneous painting projects to count, and a desk that looks like a DMZ.

Don't believe me. Here's the Desk:

Now here's the shelf of unopened shit:

Daunting, isn't it. Especially since I am going to need to move all of this stuff in the near future. We're getting a flood control system put in and planning on painting the floor to make it easier to clean. All of this stuff is going to have to be moved out for a few days. That should be fun. Then there's also the stuff that you can't see in the pictures above- the 8'x4' gaming table and 3 shelves of terrain as well as My IG (12,000+ points), Dark Angels (5,000ish points), Tyranids (4,000ish points), and Empire (2,000ish points so far) armies that will need to be moved out. If I dig deep enough, there should even be some Tau and a shitload of Battletech stuff in there somewhere. I'll need to figure out an efficient way to pack, move, and store all of this stuff in my garage. Still not daunting enough yet? Well, I also need to knock out a wall and finish removing some awesome 60s wood panelling and it's supporting framework this summer to assist in making a space functional for gaming, band practice, and exercise.

This is all kind of embarrassing, frankly. I'm generally a pretty cleanly person (as long as you don't count my car). It's time to fix the mess. Time to pop off to IKEA to pick up more efficient shelving. Time to reorganize the bins on my desk and finish off my current projects before assembling/buying anything new. I just hope there's enough time.

I'm curious to hear from you guys. Are you organized? Do you feel buried under a pile of unfinished metal/plastic? Can you fix the bad habits you've developed over the years? Do you have any tips for making and keeping deadlines for your projects?

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*Learn from my mistakes- when cleaning a garage with a high powered leaf blower (great idea!), not only do you want to wear a safety mask (I did), but you also need some type of goggles (these I did not have).

8 comments:

I'm a mess. Like in every sense of the word, almost. However, I'm working on it, partially thanks to my girlfriend forcing me to do it.

I do have some tips on that kind of stuff:1. Move stuff incrementally. If you try to do everything at once, you'll get all bogged down and not want to finish.2. Reward yourself. If you get a bunch done, do something nice for yourself. Doesn't have to be 40k related, but it can be.3. Plan. Seriously, when doing something big like moving and reorganizing, writing out an outline of how you plan to do that stuff can really help you get organized about how to do it and make sure you don't get frustrated when you miss something important. Nothing is more irritating than realizing you need one more thing and you would have it if you would have planned better.

I'm doing a whole bunch of articles about stuff like this on my blog (you inspired me, Dethtron!). Sorry for the self-promotion, but... well, dog-eat-dog world and all that.

I am what I like to call chaotically organised. I know where everything is. In that jumble over there *gestures*. Outside of my warhammer table and current research books (between us, Mrs. Kirby and I literally have a small psych library) which are always strewn hairy mary, not to mention my research print outs (we use at least 3 trees per assignment, lucky we recycle!) and living out of laundry baskets rather than hanging things up, and my coffee table (even though I don't drink coffee, let's call it the foot table) has stuff scattered all over it, and... oh okay fine. My kitchen is clean, I can't stand a messy kitchen (had some roommates before who were disgusting), same with the bedsheets and bathroom. Other than that, chaoticly organised :P.

I must say though if you need some of those models taken off your hands Dethtron :P. Got any RW Battleforces? lol. I've got about 4 projects going atm. Finishing the painting of my Eldar (and getting 1 more Serpent). Finishing the painting of my SM Mech (and getting 4 more speeders). Converting my BA Jumper/Blood Rodeo/SM Biker army with magnets (hence also the need for some RW BF). Painting my Tyranids.

Woot!

P.S. see how rock hard the leafblower is when you fail to wear safety material?

I got all my stuff organized. Had to, otherwise it's getting left behind and a 6 hour road trip to come back and get it. Terrain is in this box, VC/Nids/Tank parts in this one, and so on and so forth.

I think the pictures of the desk and shelf in the nerd-cave make it look worse than it seems. Then again, I dream of being able to leave things in the open/unattended for more than a half hour. One of them would end up gluing themselves to the table, the other would have more warpaint than the entire wild west, and the baby would somehow have found a permanent marker and went to town.

When I had the option, I went for mostly organized. Bitz were organized into bins and generally clean, but my work desk was a chaos of a dozen different projects and tools.

Now I have a 4-year old... If I leave stuff out, I end up with several of my paint pots pin-drilled through cap and sides... just to pick a "random" example. So I have to be cleaner and more organized now.

Kick ass blog network

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